That's what I thought anyway. I got into Warmachine for a spell in grad school (towards the end when I was trying really hard not to do grad school) and played Trollbloods, and eventually got some Menoth but that didn't really stick. Menoth wasn't fun to play, and while I still harbor a deep and abiding love for Trollbloods, Warmachine lost my interest. I tried to get into Frostgrave as well, and while the couple of games I got to play were fun, and you can use whatever models you want, it's been basically impossible to find people to play with.
Turns out that getting people to try a new RPG is pretty easy, but a wargame is a much harder sell.
Anyway, I live in Seattle now, and despite the city and surrounding cities having lots of game stores, and some clubs, and being home to Wizards of the Coast and Privateer Press (which makes Warmachine), care to guess what wargame people seem to play the most? Yep. 40k. I was thinking about going to one of the stores to check out Kill Team, and then Covid-19 hit and, well, open-gaming is kind of off the table these days. Discord works fine for Dungeons & Dragons, not so much for the wargames.
So I've spent much of 2020 wanting to build terrain but not having the motivation, wanting to try some solo-play but pretty sure that's not for me, and wanting to paint but none of the stuff I had. Then I finally got (sort of) caught up on Black Magic Craft, and Jeremy's video about how Nurgle saved him was the last push I needed. On Halloween 2020 I went to the local store and picked up the Commander edition starter set for 40k 9th edition.
So, preamble done! Up top is a picture of all the models in that box, arrayed on the nice board-game thick battle mat. Since I have a roommate willing to try the game out (with no prior wargaming experience) I hemmed and hawed over which starter set to get, and settled on the big one because I've always loved GW terrain, and those pipes and corners are dope.
Also the minis themselves are cool. Like, Primaris Space Marines are neat or whatever (that captain is sick as hell though!), but the Necrons are the real stars of the show. I always thought they were cool looking, and the new stuff is just awesome.
Back in the day, I fielded a lot of unpainted models, because that's what we all did. That's dumb, and I don't want to do that any more. Now, playing through the tutorial scenarios and any games after that will necessitate unpainted minis for a while, but no biggie there. My plan is to have all of them painted and battle-ready (including the terrain) before I buy anything else. Then, its buying and painting one unit at a time. Provided I want to get deeper into the game, but I know myself and I probably will in the long run.
Since the models I have are all push-fit, they're easy enough to build and play with and then take apart to paint. Because, as the title of this blog implies, I'm going to sub-assemble all these little jerks, to some extent or another. For those who aren't familiar with the term as it applies in painting minis (as far as I understand it), that means painting them in parts and then putting them together. I have frequently lamented not being able to reach a spot because of an arm or gun on a model, and that ends today! Also, because they're all put together without being glued, they sort of beg to be sub-assembled so I figured this is as good a plan as any!
